Local providers of home medical equipment set aside their competitive interests Tuesday and joined forces to lobby for help in stopping legislation deemed detrimental to the industry from taking effect early next year.

Business owners and their patients met with Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, to encourage him to sponsor a bill that would prevent competitive bidding for home medical equipment, particularly oxygen, from becoming part of the Medicare program absent demonstrated cost savings and other quality control measures. A similar bill is making its way through the House of Representatives.

"There's no doubt in my mind the way it's written, if it goes into effect, it's going to cause harm to seniors," said Greg Dunn, respiratory manager for Alpine Home Medical Equipment in Salt Lake City, where Tuesday's meeting took place.

Which is why it is important to prevent the provision from taking effect, said Tom Bradley, president of Orem-based Petersen Medical. "What we're trying to do is make sure we protect the patients, (and) we want to keep small businesses in the game."

At the conclusion of the half-hour meeting, Hatch promised to study the issue in the coming months.

"We're certainly looking at it," he said. "I have a lot of empathy with what you're saying. Everybody knows that I spend a lot of time on health-care issues."

With a January 2007 implementation date, the process requires the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to award regional contracts for home medical equipment items or services to the lowest bidder. The provision was part of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003, which Hatch co-sponsored.

Touted as a way to save precious Medicare dollars, critics maintain competitive bidding will limit consumer choice and harm small businesses and community-based providers. Ultimately, patients will be locked into the winning companies and will have no recourse for poor service, said Alpine president Jay Broadbent.

"A lot of patients, if they're not happy, they have the ability to go to another company," he said. "This will take that ability away."

Service is a large part of the home medical equipment business, both the business owners and their patients told Hatch Tuesday.

"I believe you let the patient make the decision," said Stan Bagenski, who suffered a seizure three years ago and has been on oxygen since.

"They've given me great service," Bagenski said of Alpine Home Medical Equipment, such as coming to his home to check the equipment whenever needed. "I don't think a lot of the other people would do that. They care about their customers."

According to a September 2004 report from the Government Accountability Office, competitive bidding "provides incentives for suppliers to lower their prices for items and services to retain their ability to serve Medicare beneficiaries and potentially increase their market share."

But Broadbent and other local business owners say they cannot afford to lower their prices enough to compete with larger, national companies — an idea with which Hatch appeared to agree.

"Normally we would be all for competition," the senator said, "but the way I interpret this is they're driving the caring, small businesses out of business."

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